Drippings from the Honeycomb
More to be desired are [the rules of the Lord] than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. (Psalm 19:10)
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Read pt. I here. Read Church Covenant here. We joyful commit to the following privileges and responsibilities, believing them to be the basics of being part of Christ in His local body: 3.1. To engage (think marital engagement or embarking on a serious project) is to throw your utmost effort and commitment into something. To engage in Christian love, a love which must proceed from God and be borne as a fruit of the Spirit, surely requires the help of the Holy Spirit. Only He can help us attain anything in the Christian life, for apart from Him we can do nothing (Jn 15). 3.2. To strive is likewise to be so committed to something that one works hard at it. We love the Church because Christ loved the Church; to love the Church is to love Christ (Eph 5). Yet as much as we are part of the international and heavenly spiritual body of Christ, that needs to be made visible. While we can have fellowship with all local bodies, our finiteness means we express our universal membership locally. We would be spread too thin if we tried to be everything to every church and so the Lord would have us focus our attention to the local body of which we are a part. To advance, or forward, the knowledge of the church primarily means its biblical knowledge. As we together seek to advance and conform to the teachings of Scripture the Church as a whole will grow in holiness. It is amazing to see how a church can, say, grow together through a sermon series. When we are holy and walking in the Lord’s ways we will be healthy and therefore comforted by peace and unity, with God and each other. 3.3. We want to do everything reasonably possible to promote the physical or spiritual prosperity of our local church because we love it. We do this by serving the upkeep of the building, being involved in and giving to its ministries, inviting others to our church and advancing our reputation (many of which will be unpacked in latter articles). Chiefly, we support the church by being present and active in the body, particularly, attending all its worship (the body is encourage or discouraged in how you choose to be present or absent), and every other element that is the vital core of a church: the ordinances and then discipline that form the gateway and continuance of membership and health of her members, and doctrine, which likewise informs her health and upon which the true church stands or falls (Jude 3). We want to promote all that is vital to the health of a local congregation. If we are to be healthy she must be healthy (and visa versa).
Usually we use this saying somewhat negatively, you’re not doing anything and you receive an invite and respond, ‘Sure, I don’t have anything better to do!’ (i.e. if you did you might not go!). However, we could also use it less facetiously and in a positive sense to mean, I’m doing such and such because I really don’t have anything better to do—this is the very best and highest thing I could be doing and so I wouldn’t miss it for the world.
In this latter sense we may use the phrase to speak of the Lord’s Day. Here at MBC we believe it is ‘the divinely appointed day of worship’ by Christ’s command (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor 16:22; c.f. Gen 2:1-4; Ex 20:8–11). As our greatest weekly appointment with the greatest of all Beings we really oughtn’t have anything better to do! I always remind people that I’m attend worship every Lord’s Day, not because I am the pastor, but because I’m a Christian. This has been the case throughout my life and will always remain so. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.[1] Gathering each Lord’s Day is part of mere Christianity and a basic expression of Christian discipleship. I love John the apostle for many reasons. One was that he loved Jesus so much that he worshipped the Lord on His Day and in His way (as he wants to be worshipped). John even gave us the term ‘the Lord’s Day.’ It is a possessive phrase, it’s Jesus’ day, and it’s definitive (‘the’)—it is actually a one in seven appointment. What is fascinating is that, like Daniel who though in exile was still thinking on God-time (Dan 9:21), John, though he was exiled in the island of Patmos by Emperor Domitian and physically couldn’t attend worship in Ephesus because of intense persecution, still measured the time of his vision by ‘the Lord’s Day’ and what other believers were doing (Rev 1:10). If he could have been with them he would have been. Does your time revolve around God’s time or pleasure, work, family and friends? While not in the Bible I love a story of John told by Jerome (AD c.347–420). In John’s extreme old age, he was carried into church so as to be there, such was His love for the Lord’s Day and people![2] I could tell other similar stories of faithfulness by God’s people throughout history and in my own experience, like Muriel who still came to morning and evening worship in her late 90s or Sylvia who came to church as the best place for her soul the day after her husband died. I’ve always sought to be that faithful leading example to God’s people too, evening coming on crutches the day after knee surgery as a teenager. My prayer is that, like John, we’d all have nothing better to do each and every Lord’s Day. [1] Grave illness and great emergencies excepted. When I’m not at my church I’m either preaching or visiting another. [2] The original says, “The blessed John the Evangelist lived in Ephesus until extreme old age. His disciples could barely carry him to church and he could not muster the voice to speak many words.” (Andrew Cain (translator), ‘Commentary on Galatians 6:10,’ The Fathers of the Church, St. Jerome, Commentary on Galatians. [Catholic University of America, 2010], p. 260). Cain suggests the source of the story was possibly Hegesippus's Memoirs via either Clement of Alexandria or Origen. What is Pentecost? Pentecost means 50, taken from the Greek word pente or fifty. In Hebrew it was the Feast of First-fruits (or a harvest festival) observed 50 days after Passover (Lev 23:9–14). Here, worshippers brought their the first fruits of their harvest to the Lord. Jesus spent 40 days with His disciples after His Resurrection before He ascended to heaven. He commanded them to wait in Jerusalem until they received the promised helper (Ezk 36:26–7; Joel 2:28–32, Acts 2, et al). When He came, the New Covenant people of God began! The Spirit fulfilled the longing for the ability for hard hearts to be soften to keep God’s Law, or to truly live for Him. Without the Spirit we cannot live the Christian life. And so, having been regenerated by the Spirits work to believe and be justified, now adopted we receive Him into our heart as a gift to become new creations. He is given to every believer upon faith (Gal 3:2–3). In grace, this is the first fruit God gives to us of our final salvation (Ro 8:13)! Pentecost was the last step to inaugurate the New Covenant and close the inter-covenantal period between Christ’s conception and the Spirit’s coming. Why Celebrate Pentecost? Most Christians today will observe Christmas and Passover (Easter), even if they aren’t overly liturgical. Yet, we’re only explicitly commanded to observe the Lord’s Day. However, given the weight of narrative in the Gospels and their centrality in coming together to form the basis of the New Covenant, we have warrant to modestly observe these three:
 This is what Pentecost is and why we’re remembering it this year at MBC.
Read here.
What is a church covenant? A covenant is an agreement that forms the basis of a relationship. Throughout the Bible covenants are the spine that hold the Scriptures together. Covenant is how God relates to us by His grace. As believer’s have been brought into a New Covenant (relationship) with God through belief and baptism in Jesus Christ (vertical covenant), so too believers covenant together to form a local church (horizontal covenant). We are the New Covenant community pictured in Acts. A church covenant is a voluntary promissory commitment by which believers unite together in membership to live together, by God’s grace, to fulfill God’s calling upon the local church and our Christian walk. It is a basic thing, committing to walk in the elementary things of Christ. It is solemn because to be part of Christ’s church is an awesome thing. It is joyful because to serve Christ and one another is a wonderful thing. It differentiates one local church from another local church. It is counter-cultural as we value community and commitment in an individualist and non-committal world. It is the structure that creates a place of belonging. We read our covenant every time a new member(s) joins and also regularly in between such times to remind ourselves of what we commit to in Christ as Christians walking together. All of this is why our covenant is headed with these words: "Seeing as God deals with mankind through the New Covenant, we as members of this local church, having professed Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour and been baptized by immersion in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit into His body, solemnly and joyfully covenant together before God, angels and one another as one local body in Christ, with the following promises consistent with the Biblical teaching of a New Testament Gospel church." This blog series will explain the different elements of our church covenant block by block. A recent study in the UK has coined the phrase ‘quiet revival.’ Historically revivals—periods where the Holy Spirit has wrought great repentance and faith in Jesus— have seen 100s, 1000s, indeed whole communities and nations transformed for Christ. What the study observed in the UK was not such a revival, more quiet, yet a revival nevertheless. It observed that since 2018 church attendance has doubled, especially amongst youth. This is quite something in a country so impacted by secularism that, despite being twice the population of Canada, has had half the church attendance.
Yet this ‘quiet revival’ applies not only to the UK. Arguably it describes a phenomenon across the West, including right here in Canada. Culturally it may be linked to Covid or the wackiness of wokeness. Religiously it is a quiet movement of the Spirit of God. It does appear that the Lord is watering the root of His faithful remnant (Job 14:7–9). This study helped give words to something we have been witnessing across Ontario amongst faithful churches. A church in Windsor that was 150 is now 300+. A church in Timmins was 75 and is now 150+. This past Passover (Easter) many churches experienced countless baptism, not 100s but in the 2s and 12s. Some of this growth represents seekers, brand new believers, sometimes migrating Christians from mainline churches or lapsed Christians. Closer to home in our own Association, the past few years have proven a similar trend. The church of 15/50/75/100/150/200 is now 30/100/150/300/400, etc. None of these churches have done anything ‘special’ apart from faithfully existing but the Lord has quietly been sending people to them. We have experienced this here at MBC. Just prior to Covid we hadn’t had a recent baptism, had 26 members and about 40-50 people who regularly connected with us. Since then we’ve had 9 baptisms, 38 members (in spite of natural losses) and have well over 100+ people regularly worshipping and connecting with us. Measured financially, our budget has nearly doubled and we've invested surpluses in local and foreign missions. (Yet, there is still more to do. Higher numbers require more work. We long to see the sinners amongst us saved and baptized, saints join in membership and together to worship and serve the Lord. Then there is still the vastly unreached population in our community). Yet, we would not boast in ourselves or our techniques. We haven’t done anything extraordinary, and most people have simply found us. One young man is an example. He attended our church out of the blue and simply felt prompted to Google ‘church near me.’ Our website came up since it is very active. All we have done is seek to be faithful to God’s commands for a church: gather regularly on the Lord’s Day (a.m./p.m.) in worship; preach the Word; pray; provide opportunities for discipleship; seek to make Christ known in our community; visit and care for each other; invest in our facilities, etc. (1 Cor 3:6). We rejoice at what the Lord is doing—however quietly! Would you join us in what He is doing? In the light of the Resurrection, Jesus commissioned His followers with a great task before ascending to the Father in glory (Mt 28:18–20). Just as Adam and Eve were to be fruitful and multiply, we as His followers, are to fill the earth with His disciples by proclaiming the good merits of His Death and Resurrection and commanding all peoples to have faith in and follow the Risen King.
But how do you ‘make disciples’? Discipleship, or the process of making and growing disciples, may be likened to chin ups. I’m not a huge fan of chin ups. My strength lies more in my legs than my arms and I find it easier to run than to lift my body weight. Reaching the chin up bar is a challenge. Yet this is the illustration my friend uses to describe discipleship and one that depicts a phrase in the Bible that I’ve often likewise used to describe it, truth and love. God the Father has given us the perfect standard of His Royal Law. Matthew 5:48 says, ‘Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” His holy standard—all that He expects and commands of us in His Word—is really high. Far from lifting ourselves up to the bar, we can’t even jump high enough to reach the bar! As disciplers we hold the bar just as high as the Father, but we also help people reach the bar. Like a coach we don’t blast the trainee for not knowing how to do it, or doing it properly, or failing to attain it. Nor do we say, ‘oh it’s ok that you haven’t attained to it,’ Instead we say, ‘there is the bar, now let me help you be able to reach it.’ The Bible has the same word—depending on context—that can be meant for both challenge and encouragement. It is parakaleo (παρακαλέω) and means to call+beside. It can be translated exhort, urge implore or comfort, encourage and invite. For unbelievers we do not shrink from sharing the bad news of judgement apart from faith in Christ, but we also encourage by sharing our testimony, by declaring how good the Lord is and that He doesn’t cast off any who come to Him. For believers, we likewise maintain that Jesus has commanded us to do X, Y and Z, yet do even this in ‘gentleness and respect,’ reminding them of the forgiveness our Lord offers when they fall and continuing to call them to yield to the Spirit and the Word. The Lord has given us the Helper, God’s Law is no longer a threat but a promise—I will get you there! I’ve owned two Border collies. While they somewhat train themselves, they do require training, or discipleship. My present dog is 7 months. He is a work in progress! My previous dog died at 12 years of age, travelled the world with me and was very special to me. Throughout her life people would often comment, ‘your dog is so affectionate and obedient, you must have taken her to obedience school, how did you do it.’ By grace (for I’m not professional dog trainer), I’d say, “no there were only two ingredients: love and discipline. I’d reinforce positive behaviour and dissuade negative behaviour.” Humans are much superior to dogs, however, this principle is the same essential principle that I use for raising my son and also what I’ve used in Christian discipleship. In fact, with variation, this is what we see consistently (and effectively) used throughout Church history. The Lord has set the bar high for His people—we musn’t shrink away from it. Yet the bar is so impossibly high that not even we have attained it. In humility we help each other by the Spirit to rise to the high calling our King commands. That is chin up discipleship. *This blog seeks to speak into a conversations I’ve heard many Christians wrestle with in our post-Christian age. For most secular Canadians today, Easter is a nice spring holiday to eat chocolate while enjoying time off work. Its imagery of bunnies and chicks speak of spring and new life (themselves pagan symbols). This is a far cry from conjuring up images of the cross and empty tomb, which alone offer true life. Because Easter and Easter don’t mean the same thing anymore, perhaps it is time for a change, to rename Easter? We have further warrant. Easter itself, or Eostre, was a Germanic pagan fertility goddess.* Her worship was popular in Northern Europe to mark the spring equinox. When Christianity came to the now countries of England and Germany, the pagan festival was subsumed into the Christian festival that remembered Jesus’ death and resurrection. However, the name Eostre was retained (a form of evangelistic rebranding). Wherever German or English has gone in the world the name for the season has remained Easter for some 1000+ years. However, the non-Germanic Christian world (i.e. Spanish, French, Italian, Russian, Greek, etc) calls the season Pascha or Passover in continuity with the Old Covenant feast when Jesus died and rose. This was the wording of the Church Fathers. While Good Friday, Holy/Passion[1] Week or Lent wasn’t developed in early Christianity until c. 4th century, Passover (Easter) has been celebrated the first Lord’s Day after the lunar Old Covenant Passover since the earliest church period; officially standardized since AD 325.[2] This all makes perfect sense. Jesus was the Passover lamb (1 Cor 5:7), fulfilling the Old Covenant festival of Passover, giving it new meaning for believers and simplifying it under the New Covenant as the Lord’s Supper (Mk 14:22–25; 1 Cor 11:17–34). The weeklong Passover in the Old Testament wasn’t just about remembering God's judgement upon the firstborn passing over those with the blood of a lamb (i.e. Good Friday) but the Exodus from slavery to new life in the Promised Land. Likewise, the New Covenant Passover remembers the believers' rescue from slavery to sin (Cross) and into new spiritual life (Resurrection).[3] To distinguish ourselves from secular and medieval paganism, and unite ourselves to the flow of Scripture, the witness of tradition, we ought to join the rest of the Christian world in calling the season of Easter ‘Passover.’ Passover would then be broken into the two pillar days:  Taken together, Passover remembers the great essence of the Gospel and the promise of the New Covenant, forgiveness of sin and life eternal, of passing over from death to life (Jn 5:24). * https://www.etymonline.com/word/Easter
[1] Passion means suffering. [2] Prior to the Council of Nicea there were two traditions: the churches in Asian Minor followed the Jewish pattern of the 14th of Nissan (lunar), whereas the churches in Palestine, Egypt and Italy followed the first Lord’s Day after the 14th of Nissan (weekly). (Nick Needham, 2000 Years of Christ's Power, vol. 1 [2016], 80). As such it is the day of the week and not day of the month that is commemorated. [3] Egypt=sin; Passover lamb= Jesus; Red Sea= baptism; wilderness= our life before glory; the Promised Land= the New Heavens and New Earth. [4] I call it a season vs. a festival or a holiday (holy day) because there is only one holy day commanded under the New Covenant and that is the Lord’s Day. [5] We are not commanded to observe Good Friday under the New Covenant as we are the weekly Lord’s Day, however, given the weight allotted to the event in Scripture and its integral part in the establishment of the New Covenant, it is warranted. [6] It is difficult to escape paganism entirely as even our days of the week are named after Roman gods. Good is in the sense of holy or special, because of what is remembered. [7] Tertullian, in the 3rd century, said something like, ‘not to be ashamed of calling it Sunday for it was the Day of the Son.’ Titus 2:2& 6
(A brief overview of our all ages men’s breakfast talk on Mar 22, 2025) [Have boys build a playdough house while we begin] You might remember PM Jean Chretien (Christian); a rather normal PM compared to those more recently. However, even in his day he had those who disagreed with him who would sometimes call him Jean Cretan (the French word for moron!). This word comes from the context of the ministry of Titus, which was Crete, 1:5, 12. We too live in a crazy world, don’t we? The craziness of Crete was made worse by false teachers, who likewise add to our present troubles as well—nothing new under the sun (1:10–11). Titus’ mission, therefore, was 1:5. How could he set things in order? Because the Gospel changes lives, or truth truly trusted transforms (1:1). The Gospel produces good works in our lives (good works don’t save us but they do show we are saved). ‘Good works’ is mentioned 13x in the NT, 6x of them in Titus! Speaking of good works, boys, let’s see your houses. [Access the houses made] A man named Wilberforce likened faith and living to a house. The house is our faith, what goes on in the house the result of our faith (otherwise known as orthodoxy and orthopraxy). It is the ideal of a health home, solid and lived in. Titus paints a picture of a healthy church. In ch. 2 he particularly identifies how different genders and ages ought to live, in our case, men. (The Church is both visible and invisible. We visibly look like part of the church if we hang around Christians. We invisibly join the church through Jesus Christ and then visible display that. The Gospel, and not just attending church, is what is needed (and presumed) if these things will be true in your life). Question- Who is an older man? [ask youth] Who is a younger man? [ask seniors] Age is someone subjective, isn’t it. All men are old if you are 6 and everyman is young if you are 90. To give an objective threshold, let’s use 30 as the divider, the age when you could become a rabbi in Jesus’ day. An age, whereby, one would expect you’ve had life experience, got a job, been married, had children, etc. Older men (presbyter, or elder) was a term used of men with experience and age. It highlighted the virtues of wisdom, experience, authority and respect in the ancient world. Younger men (neos, or new [pais= children, but here I’m lumping everyone under 30 together])= fresh into adulthood and conveyed virtues of freshness, strength, renewal and hope. Now, there is often a tension between old and young, isn’t there (the old look down on the young and visa versa). However, Scripture paints a more balanced picture Lev 19:32; 1 Ti 4:12; Prov 20:29. Let’s consider what Paul expected of older and younger men—a mirror for us to see whether we’re being transformed into good works by the truth. It is harder to be old! Question- What six things are expected of older men? We ought to be aspiring to these things with the help of the Spirit. Speaking of the Spirit, the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5) ends with a commonality between the old and young—self-control. You see, as sinners, we’re all born wild [open chest door and make monkey sounds]. Activity- boys, spread out and be wild for 15 sec; now- stand on one foot touch your nose and hold your back for 15 secs… Which was harder? It is easy to be wild, we are naturally; far more difficult to be self-controlled. For this we need the Lord’s grace. Question- how is self-control the root of the virtues of the older man? How is self-control needed/what does it look like for a young man/old man? Again, self-control is the root of manly godliness. If we don’t follow Titus’ wider and specific teaching, we’ll be wild morons further led astray by false teachers. If we would aspire to be true men of God, we must have faith in and follow Jesus, bringing forth these good works. |
